1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a bus structure for a bus structure, a terminal block, and a terminal block assembly formed therefrom. More particularly, it relates to a bus structure, a terminal block, and a terminal block assembly formed therefrom that help to prevent device failure due to wrong, reverse combination between the bus structure and the terminal block.
2. Description of Related Art
A terminal block is an electronic component extensively used in various machines, whose function is to connect two or more sets of power cords, control wires or data transmission lines. Such a terminal block is typically configured to work with a bus structure.
Particularly, the bus structure comprises a bus body and a positioning rail combined together. The bus body is provided with plural bus bars, and the terminal block is removably mounted on a positioning rail, so that a connector built in the terminal block can be engaged with the bus bars for electrical connection.
In order to prevent wrong installation, a traditional terminal block is designed with a fool-proof structure. As shown in FIG. 10, the bus body 91 has a projecting portion 911 and a depressed portion 912, while the connector 920 of the terminal block 92 also has a projecting portion 921 and a depressed portion 922. When the bus body 91 and the terminal block 92 are correctly combined, the projecting portion 911 of the bus body 91 can get engaged with the depressed portion 922 of the connector 920, and the projecting portion 921 of the connector 920 can be inlaid into the depressed portion 912 of the bus body 91. On the other hand, in case of reverse installation, as shown in FIG. 11, the projecting portion 911 of the bus body 91 with interfere with the projecting portion 921 of the connector 920, disallowing the bus body 91 and the terminal block 92 to be combined.
While the traditional fool-proof structure is somehow workable to prevent wrong installation, in the event that a larger pushing force is applied to push the terminal block 92 toward the bus body 91, relative sliding can happen between the bus body 91 and the terminal block 92. In other words, though the projecting portion 911 of the bus body 91 and projecting portion 921 of the connector 920 can retain each other to some extent, when the applied force is relatively large, the both can still slide with respect to each other, making the connecting components of the both impact and in turn break.